1884.] 45 [Hyatt. 



Mr. S. H. Scudder showed with the microscope some washings 

 of the boulder clays from the Chicago water supply, including 

 among other matter specimens of Sporangites, or macrospores. 



Genekal Meeting, March 5, 1884. 



Ex-President, Mr. T. T. Bouve, in the chair. Thirty-two per- 

 sons present. 



Mr. ¥m. S. Whitwell was elected an Associate Member. 

 The following paper was read : 



LARVAL THEORY OF THE ORIGIN OF CELLULAR TISSUES. 



BY ALPHEUS HYATT. 



The opinion that the higher animals are complex, colonial ag- 

 gregates of cells, which in structure are equivalents of the lowest 

 and minutest adult forms of the animal kingdom, the unicellular 

 bodies of Protozoa, has been steadily gaining in probability since 

 it was first announced by Oken in 1805 in "Die Zeugung," 

 Frankfurt bei Wesche, 8vo. This work we have not yet seen, 

 but in the first edition of *the Naturphilosophie, Jena 1809, n, 

 xii Buch, Zoogenie, he describes protoplasm as "Punctsubstanz" 

 and as giving rise to the " Blasenform or Zellform " in both ani- 

 mals and plants. Oken considered the lower animals " Polypen, 

 Medusen, Beroen, kurz alle Gallertthiere " to be composed of 

 " Punctsubstanz." The nerves, cartilage, bones of higher animals 

 were considered as modifications of this form of protoplasm, but 

 the skin and fleshy parts including the viscera were described as 

 cellular, " dem Feisch liegt die Blaschenform zur grunde," again 

 on p. 30, " die Eingeweide welche am meistens aus Zellengeweb 

 bestehen." Oken in xii, viii Buch, treats of the subject we 

 are more immediately interested with, and writes as follows ; 

 " Pflanzen und Thiere konnen nur Metamorphosen von Infusorien 

 sein," "im kleinsten sind sie nur infusoriale Blaschen die durch 

 verschiedene Combinationen sich verschieden gestalten und zu 

 hoheren Organismen aufwachsen," and also adds on p. 29 in anti- 



